Slow System

We have about 12,000 contacts in our system and it is really slow espcially when you first sign in and are going to each of the views for the first time=2E Even on the back end when you are in enterprise manager it is rather slow=2E Our slowness is not just in a certain group=2E We have upgraded the server to 2 gigs of memory and that did nothing=2E We have it where all users see all the contacts and accounts=2E We have about 80 users=2E Some are all at the same location of the server and some are at different locations but all of them are rather slow=2E Does anyone have any ideas of what could be causing this and what we can do to fix it?

If this is 6.1/2 - this is a known issue and due to the way the forms and
groups are initially cached. No amount of new hardware/memory will cure the
problem so don't bother trying. Best thing is to start up 1st thing and
leave it open all day (or, use TermServer and have the entire session
cached).

Does this mean that each user has the All Contacts and All Accounts as the
default opening view ?? This is bad practice and you should set them to
something like "My Contacts" or "Latest Contacts". As each user, when they
start up, will retrieve the entire data set (and for no good reason) and
this does slow things down a heck of a lot. In fact, you should DELETE those
groups straight away !!

You could create an a/c that is just one record - and set everyone to that.
There is *no* reason why people need to use the All Contacts/Accounts group
- you can still query for any piece of data at any time. It's a bit of a
misnomer in that people insist on seeing everything except, unless they are
God and omnipresent, they can't work with Everyone simultaneously !

Also, I was a bit rushed when I said "no amount of hardware.." - of course,
a small Cray would most likely speed things up I'm sure. But your issue is
simply down to 80 users all trying to load the entire DB for no good reason
and, of course, because there is an issue with the caching of initial
forms/groups as mentioned previously.

And yes I do know it is a known issue with SLX 6.1 but the thing is it
is not just when you are using the program it is also with the
enterprise manager. SLX programs have even looked at everything and
can't find the reason. I just wanted to see if anyone else has had the
problem even in enterprise manager and not just the SLX program.

Are you using TCP/IP as the default protocol on SQL Server? If it's
trying to default to named pipes you could see that performance hit. It
would also explain why the performance is bad in EM as well as the
client.

Also it pays to have the SQL Client connectivity tools. Even though a
computer can function with SalesLogix perfectly fine without it (Windows
2000+), it could cause performance anxiety amongst your network. I have a
couple of machines without it and I don't really notice a difference but
then again we have at most 3000 contacts and I've done as much performance
tweaking in the application as I could (moving all users to Latest Groups,
etc).

And I am hit with the preverbial "duh". It makes complete sense and all I
can say about that is yay. I hated the extra install and the need for the
CD-Key when running the full SQL product on a computer that won't install
anything BUT the client connectivity stuff. I don't even want to get started
on that headache but it's good to know it's not necessary now. *Uninstalls
from all machines*. Thanks

Only my 2 cents worth but if everything is running slowly on the server
don't you just need to do your normal Microsoft type troubleshooting to see
why the server is running slow ?

i.e. I hear what mikes saying about the client but if sql enterprise manager
is running slowly too then it would seem to just be the Microsoft stuff
which isn't working

You might want to check that no-one has set sql to only use a maximum amount
of memory - if they have then you putting in more will have no effect as
it'll still use the same amount - just a thought but, like io say, if
everything runs slowly on the server falling back on standard trouble
shooting of windows and sql servers is probably your best bet

In the Client Options (or via Admin, for each user you can override what the
user has set).
In Admin, go to a user and select the Client Settings tab - on right hand
side select the default group. If you change all of them, then any new user
(based on a template would get these). You can also lock it so that user
can't change it by switching off "Allow user to change these settings".

There are some stored procedures that give you more control. The slider I
think deals with dynamic memory, which can fluctuate based on load. There
are some settings for like min memory and max memory which you can use to
either force SQL to one size or give it a range of a size and have it stick
to it.

The procedures are sp_configure 'max server memory', (size in bytes) and
sp_configure 'min server memory', (size in bytes). You could also use
sp_configure to see a list of things you can tweak or use sp_configure 'show
advanced options', 1 to show even more options.

Using the defaults are usually not recommended. On a small server like ours,
I could get away with the defaults for a little while but bumping these
settings up to use a minimum of say 128mb (768mb total) up to 256mb max is
good. That means that it will NEVER drop below 128mb whereas if you were to
use the GUI and to set that slider, it has a POSSIBILITY of dropping to 0.

Most likely you may have an application that is hogging up a ton of memory,
leaving very little for SQL. If this is the case, you will see the very same
symptoms you are describing. EM would be slow as dirt, the Admin and any
SalesLogix app would be slow as dirt (because it NEEDS SQL to survive). All
other programs may function normally on the box but most likely even they
may be feeling the effects of some process taking more than it's share of
the pie. If you set these parameters, SQL will effectively take and horde
all of the memory it needs even if it's not in use. This also means that if
you were to set the min and max settings too high, SQL would bring the rest
of the system to its knees.

The sp's you mention are the same as using the GUI - Max Server Memory
actually adjusts the dynamically configure memory slider i.e. if you did:

sp_configure, "max server memory", "350"
reconfigure with override

Then this will set MaxMem to 350Mb (not bytes). Similarly, if you go to GUI
you will find the slider has adjusted to match 350.

Even if the Min Mem is set to 128 - then SQL will still release this memory
when told to do so by the operating system, if the OS requires it - unless
the checkbox "Reserve physical memory" is on.

The best settings are Dynamically configured, Min 0, Max 85% of max mem.
This means that SQL and OS work in concert to manage memory. However, that
said, if you have very little memory to start with then this "internal
management" quickly becomes and overhead and the whole thing starts
swapping/paging like crazy !

Mike

Jalbur - can you post the spec of the machine and also the output of the
following:

There is a service pack coming out for SLX 6=2E2 and it's suppose to fix the memory leak issue that's making the Sales Client so slow=2E Is there any word on the truth of this and when it's suppose to be released? The last I heard was mid January=2E We are going to be releasing 6=2E2 the second week of February and want to make sure we can load the service pack or else we're going to have some unsatisfied users with the slowness of the system=2E

If the memory leak isn't the reason that SalesLogix is slow, then when is
the Service Pack going to be out that fixes the slowness of SalesLogix and
the memory leak issue? They're saying end of January, but who knows if
that'll hold up.